After All, I'm Your Secret Admirer~!!

Ch30 - Backlot

OJ looks concerned for a moment before shaking his head a bit. "Yes, I did." He speeds up just a bit, effortlessly taking the lead for the two of them now. "If it's not too much, there's this place I wanted to visit with you."

"Me?" Paige asks. "How come?"

"Ah..." OJ looks away shyly. "I just thought you'd like it."

The hand in Paige's twitches a bit, squeezing it. It's an innocent gesture, but it sends Paige into an immediate tizzy.

Quickly he tries to remember the frankly silly amount of teen crush articles he had gone through a while back. What did it mean if someone you like squeezed your hand again?

"I'm—I'd love to go!" Paige says, a wide but shy smile on his face. "What—where is it?"

"Rather close to my house, actually," OJ responds. "You probably saw it when we passed it in the RV without even knowing it."

"Well now I can't wait to see what it is!" Paige laughs.

"It's just a couple of blocks this way." OJ points up the sidewalk. "So we'll be there soon."

"Awesome!"

On the way there, the two catch up with one another a bit, mostly surrounding their school activities. Paige does his best to sound like he actually remembers the majority of his classes.

Other than that, the conversation wanders to games and cartoons ("You simply must see this one old cartoon, it's called The Life and Times of Juniper Lee!") and Paige simply enjoys OJ's company. They're having a great time, both trading facts and jokes and jabs. For a moment, it feels like they'd never stopped hanging out as much as they did in the past.

Then, OJ takes a sudden turn, cutting off Paige mid sentence. "Woah!" he gasps. "OJ, where are we going?"

"Oh, we're here actually." A bit of walking leaves the two of them staring at a thick bunch of ironically thin vines. They must have been here for ages.

"Um, OJ..." Paige mumbles. "This is a wall of plants."

OJ laughs so hard he doubles over a bit.

Paige frowns a little. "Wh—I don't get the joke...?"

OJ catches his breath soon after, wiping his eyes. "Sorry! Sorry!" he gasps. "I—I'm so sorry."

"What was so funny?"

OJ shakes his head, a smile on his face. "It was unfair of me to assume you would just know. But I've been coming here so often, I suppose I just accepted it as common knowledge."

Paige furrows his brows, putting one finger to his chin. "So... what... what is it, exactly?

"Here," OJ says, grabbing one end of the vines. "I'll show you!"

And, with one fell swoop, OJ pulls back the curtain of vines.

Past them is a small but flourishing patch of grass, wildflowers everywhere. It's mostly surrounded by buildings, but there's places you can clearly see through them, showing the bright sky ahead. The place is clearly unkempt, but it's almost... methodical in a way? Like it was being carefully taken care of to only look a bit bad and not a lot bad.

And, smack dab in the middle of the place is a pair of swings. The bar holding them up is broken with sharp ends, suggesting that there used to be more to the set. But there's no other proof, just that one thing. The swing's chains, which should probably look shiny, instead look like black tar, strongly holding onto each other.

Leading up to the swings is a plank of wood, flanked by small fences. The wood then goes around and under the swings, also being blocked on all sides by wooden fencing. It's a perfect little patio set up seemingly in the middle of a random small lot in the back of some buildings.

"Woah..." Paige breathes.

"Do you like it?" OJ asks, hands clasped together in front of his chest. "I found this place during summer vacation. I then spent time fixing it up as much as I could, making the road to and from the swingset easier to traverse, as well as reinforcing the swings themselves. I spread a couple of quick growing seeds around after that, hoping it would up the atmosphere." He looks extremely proud of his work. "Everything else is completely natural, that mostly being the amount of grass that was already here, as well as the unaltered swingset."

"OJ..." Paige gasps. "That's so incredible! How did you...?"

"Ma likes cars, but he also likes carpentry," OJ chuckles. "What's that one saying? Apples not falling so far from the tree?"

"This is so cool, OJ!" Paige grins, jumping over and giving him a hug. "You're so cool!"

OJ starts laughing in an odd kind of way, starting and stopping every second. He honestly sounds a bit embarrassed. He was always so humble!

Paige lets go of OJ and holds one of his hands instead. "Can we sit on the swings together? I haven't swung on a swing in what feels like forever."

"O-of course," OJ stutters, looking down shyly.

Paige tilts his head a bit, looking down too. Only then does he realize that he's the one who started to hold OJ's hand this time, which makes him think of the sudden hug he gave OJ just a moment ago as well.

He has the sudden urge to pull away, scared that he's crossing boundaries they haven't reestablished yet, but...

OJ hasn't pulled away once.

So maybe it was okay?

Paige lets his hopefulness win, pulling OJ towards the swings. When they get there, they both take a seat, looking out at the sky.

They swing lightly, Paige smiling wide. It's peaceful, even though the only thing that fills the air is the wind.

"Ah, Paige," OJ says after a couple of minutes. "There's actually something else I wanted to ask you."

"Oh, okay!" Paige smiles brightly, turning towards the other. "Hit me."

OJ nods, a small smile of his own showing. "Well, tomorrow happens to be the last day of the extended season for Luna Park. And my cousin has the uncanny ability to find sales and deals for anything in the world for some reason. I asked if there were any for the park, and they were able to get me two fairly cheap band deals."

"Band?" Paige blinks.

"Oh, it's a newer system than the old park. You know how you used to have to pay admission?"

"I guess," Paige says. "I never really went to Brooklyn growing up, so I think I've only gone to Coney Island once or twice."

"Ah," Orville nods. "We go fairly often, so it's unsurprising you wouldn't know of the updates. That being said, the bands are like... they allow you to ride a certain amount of rides for a certain amount of credits instead of buying tickets to every ride. It comes out cheaper, somehow. I've never really cared to do the math... but now that I think of it..."

Paige smiles softly. OJ was so cute when he rambled. And he always found a way to get on some type of tangent no matter what. It was so charming!

"Ah, anyways," OJ says, shaking his head. "I acquired these tickets for a quarter of the usual price, which is good since the normal price shoots up during the extended season. So, to make a long story short, I was wondering if you would like to go to the park with me tomorrow...?"

Paige gasps happily, huge smile breaking out over his face. "I'd love to!"